Moon and Earth to Scale

The diameter of the Moon is 3480 km or 27% of the Earth's equatorial diameter of 12,756 km. The mass of the moon is 1.23% of the mass of the Earth, or about 1/80th. The density of the Moon is 3.34 g/cm3 compared to 5.52 g/cm3 for the Earth, so its overall composition is quite different, apparently lacking a large iron core. This composite image uses the famous "Blue Marble" image of the Earth taken by the Apollo 17 astronauts. Image credit NASA.

The Moon's average distance from the Earth is 384,000 km which amounts to 30.1 Earth diameters.
Image of Moon and Earth from Mercury
The Sun's diameter of 1,392,000 km is 109 times the Earth's equatorial diameter of 12,756 km. The distance to the Earth from the sun at 149,000,000 km = 1 AU is 107 times the diameter of the Sun and 388 times the Earth-Moon distance. The Earth-Moon distance is not shown to scale in the above composite. The diameter of the Sun is 3.6 times the Earth-Moon distance. Above, the Earth and Moon are scaled relative to an image of the Sun made by the SOHO satellite on January 12, 2007.
Index

Moon Concepts

Solar System Concepts

Solar System Exploration
 
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